Give over with the shining light of justice and the nazi comparisons. -

Not only Nazi mass murderer...

What Poland would had needed is a kind of "Stasi-Behörde" as in the ex-GDR. All found documents laid out in the open where all concerned citizen could take a look and learn who had done what.

Those who had been a little bit to eager to support the system, after it could be proven with these files, found it hard to just to "move on" in the re-unified Germany. They also had to face the people they helped to terrorize and to opress, no hiding possible.

@Bratwurst Boy, what you doubt then is the effectiveness of such re-education programs, I take it. In other words, "You can the man out of the SS-uniform, but not the uniform out of the man", is that sort of it?

For any dyed in the wool ideologue of whatever stripe, I'd have to agree with you there.

You can the man out of the SS-uniform, but not the uniform out of the man", is that sort of it?

Believe it or not, but even in the SS there were "leaders" and "followers"...

I don't deny that people can learn and change their minds for the better but what I doubt is any kind of institutionalized re-education. I grew up indoctrinated, I was educated to see the world in a special way, to say the right slogans, to accept what I've been told...hence I know that what comes out of such an "re-education" are not necessarily "believer" but people who had learnt to SAY what they was demanded of them, just to not get into the hots, but who also THINK differently otherwise, just keeping it to themselves.

Official re-educating is not necessarily successful..people don't work that way or the communist countries would flourish!

What decommunization? Some soft talk and no action is hardly anything.

are mostly dead since that kind of repression was largely ended in the 50s

Hmm, obviously you are painfully ignorant as to the crimes of t he Soviets and traitors?They have been mowing people on the streets in 1956, 1970, 1976 and in 1980. People were actually killed lots of them. Not to mention those in prison or what not.

How about series assassinations carried out by the dead squat that had never been even investigated people. Some people were murdered in the 90'.

At that is only a tip of the ice berg, when it comes to crimes committed that involved the money issue, politicks or whatnot.

How dare you talk your ignorant talk?

magnitude from someone working in a concentration camp.

Not on the moral ground. It just the same. Hell even commie scum that run such a commie camps after 1945 has gotten scot free.If we talk about those people latter in the day of the Soviet rule it kind of different because their were mostly renegades and traitors to their nation. Different level of scum still totalitarian scum like the Nazis on a lower rug due to traitorous and cowardly nature of their actions.

It has been compared with other totalitarian regime. I think it is a valid and justified comparisons.

Prople who organised killings during martial law should be tried.

I don't care about it.I would rather go after WSI characters and others of that ilk.I would rather that Poland build a new institution on new values and for that there are needed not only a new organization, laws and rules but also a new people. Those who are unsullied by the practices and mindset of the Soviet functionaries and pen pushers.

makes complete sense to me after being here for five years , I hate those sad community dinosaur figures who think they wield ultimate power over people just because the hold a official position , they expect me to doff my cap to them lol no chance , I just feel sorry for those who have to creep around them to get the service that they have every right to. they should not have to feel subservient or be disadvantaged due to old corrupt commie practices and attitudes.

Yes, his name was Herbert Sulzbach OBE. He won an Iron Cross in the First World War at the Battle of the Somme. He wrote a memoir of his First World War service entitled With The German Guns. He was actually Jewish which makes his work with the SS prisoners all the more impressive.

But it seems the camp he worked so successfully was Featherstone Park Camp by Haltwhistle in Northumberland, a camp for german officers.

That was about a year after his time at Cultybraggan. His private papers are held at the Imperial War Museum and are catalogued as including " his service with the Pioneer Corps (1940 - 1944), his work as Interpreter in camps for German POWs at Comrie, Droitwich and Featherstone Park (January 1945 - June 1948) - " Cultybraggan Camp is just outside the village of Comrie.

The British Army keep impeccable records of army service and there can be no doubt about his service at Cultybraggan. He was posted there in January of 1945 as Staff Sergeant. On 11 November of that year, Armistice Day, he invited the 4,000 German prisoners to assemble on the football field voluntarily for a service of remembrance.

"If you agree with my proposal, parade on November 11 on your parade ground and salute the dead of all nations-your comrades, your former enemies, all murdered fighters for freedom who laid down their lives in German concentration-camps-and make the following vow; 'Never again shall such murder take place! It is the last time we will allow ourselves to be deceived and betrayed. It is not true that we Germans are a superior race; we have no right to believe that we are better than others. We are all equal before God, whatever our race or religion. Endless misery has come to us, and we have realized where arrogance leads...In this minute of silence, at 11 a.m. on this November 11, 1945, we swear to return to Germany as good Europeans, and to take part as long as we live in the reconciliation of all people and the maintenance of peace..."

Only ten refused to attend.

You should never rely solely on Wikipedia :))

@Bratwurst Boy and Lyzko, just to wrap it up, I thought you might be interested to know that all the officers in charge at Featherstone were Jewish, Captain Walter Merkel, Sulzbach and Lieutenant-Colonel Vickers. The prisoners at Cultybraggan were all categorized as 'black' which was code for the most virulent Nazis. Those at Featherstone were black and grey. Vickers told the prisoners that he had been a PoW in Germany during WWI and that he had been treated as a gentleman so that's how he intended to treat them. Gradually they were given more freedom and at Christmas 1946 they were invited to spend Christmas Day with local families in their homes.

One of the prisoners, on returning to Germany, wrote to Merkel:

"I cannot but thank you for all the kindness and humane understanding you showed, not only to myself, but also to the other PoWs in 'C' compound.....

Most of those British officers under the command of Colonel Vickers have done more for understanding between our two nations, by the way of treatment in the camp, than statesmanship can ever hope to achieve."